How often should you roll stress?
I've been reading the one-shot adventure Overrun (I'll try to keep things spoiler free), and I realized that I'm unsure of how often to roll stress? Do you roll for every encounter? How about just the first time encounter? Is there some guidelines of when and where to roll?
STRESSFUL SITUATIONS, on p. 229 of the core rulebook, does not mention the frequency of stress rolls, only the kinds of things that might give stress and the stress damage they might inflict.
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How often should you roll stress?
Sun, 2020-05-17 08:42
#1
DivineWrath
How often should you roll stress?
Sun, 2020-05-17 12:46
#2
ICU2
This is really important.
This is really important. There needs to be a refractory period otherwise PCs will be going insane very quickly. Finding a three scenes of horrific violence only minutes and meters apart is probably not as damaging as seeing the same scenes days and kilometers apart. Likewise, being in the presence of an async that's dropping a power several times in a one-minute period is probably no worse than witnessing them doing it once in that same minute.
Mon, 2020-05-25 17:15
#3
ArmokGoB
This is part of what I
This is part of what I brought up in my "Psi Sleight Stress" post and never got an answer.
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Tue, 2020-05-26 04:18
#4
ICU2
I'm pretty sure there is no
I'm pretty sure there is no answer in the book.
It would be interesting if the refractory period was shorter the higher your COG score. IOW, the deeper a thinker you are, the more these kinds of things are going to bother you. The low COG person may get zapped for Stress and not have to check again (for exposure to the same kind of stimuli) for several hours, but the ultra-high COG unfortunately processes faster and might be subject to the same source of Stress again after only several minutes. You could put INT in there somewhere too, perhaps with INT being a secondary resistance check during the refractory period. Just suggestions, adjust to taste.
Wed, 2020-05-27 10:31
#5
syberwasp
Narrative need...
I think this falls into GM discretion, how fast do you need or want them to lose their mind?
If they take tomuch stress then you have characters that are crazy and no use to anyone. If they are not picking up stress after the first few events then the mechenic is wasted. Its a balanceing acts.
My goal has always start with a little stress then slowly ramp it up as they do crazier things, thet them ride the edge of that wave upto the climax.
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Poe